Best Polish drama movies
A curated collection of popular drama movies from Poland.
Katyn (2007)
Katyn (2007)
On September 1st, 1939, Nazi Germany invades Poland, unleashing World War II. On September 17th, the Soviet Red Army crosses the border. The Polish army, unable to fight on two fronts, is defeated. Thousands of Polish men, both military and government officials, are captured by the invaders. Their fate will only be known several years later.
Warsaw 44 (2014)
Warsaw 44 (2014)
City of Warsaw, Poland, August 1st, 1944. Citizens have experienced inhuman acts of terror and violence during five long years of Nazi occupation. As the Soviet Army relentlessly approaches, the youngest and bravest among them rise up as one and face tyranny fighting street by street, but the price to pay will be high and hard the way to freedom…
Hatred (2016)
Hatred (2016)
Summer of 1939. Zosia is a young Polish girl who is deeply in love with Ukrainian Petro. Their great love will be put to the test when her father decides to marry her to a wealthy widower Skiba. Right after wedding she is left alone because her husband is drafted to the Polish army for the war with Germany. Meanwhile, tensions grow due to Jews, Poles, and Ukrainians living side by side.
Ashes and Diamonds (1958)
Ashes and Diamonds (1958)
A young academy soldier, Maciek Chelmicki, is ordered to shoot the secretary of the KW PPR. A coincidence causes him to kill someone else. Meeting face to face with his victim, he gets a shock. He faces the necessity of repeating the assassination. He meets Krystyna, a girl working as a barmaid in the restaurant of the "Monopol" hotel. His affection for her makes him even more aware of the senselessness of killing at the end of the war. Loyalty to the oath he took, and thus the obligation to obey the order, tips the scales.
Kanal (1957)
Kanal (1957)
During the last few days of the Warsaw Uprising following World War II, a modest group of Resistance members remains. The band must take refuge in the sewers under the orders of leader Zadra, but it's only a matter of time before they will have to emerge. However, when they try, they are met only with intense hostility from the Nazis. Despite their attempts stay resolute through immense mental strain, it becomes increasingly apparent that they may be doomed.
Rose (2012)
Rose (2012)
This harrowing tale of survival centers on Rose, a Masurian woman, whose German soldier husband was killed in the war, leaving her alone on their farm. A single woman had no defense against Russian soldiers who raped as a form of revenge, nor against plundering Poles who found themselves in desperate straits. Help arrives for Rose in the form of Tadeusz, a former officer in the Polish Home Army who deserted after he saw his wife raped and murdered by Russian troops and is attempting to hide his identity.
Stones for the Rampart (2014)
Stones for the Rampart (2014)
To be defeated and not be - a victory. This is the motto that life is guided by three young friends: Alek, Sophy and Rudy. Scouts, high school graduates high school in Warsaw drifting ambitious plans for the future broken through September 1939. Entering adulthood in a very dramatic times, which puts them a choice - to survive at any cost, or to join the fighting for a free homeland, risking everything. The boys brought up in patriotic homes, shaped by the ideals of scouting, they decide to fight. They become soldiers, and although every scrape with death, they can live a full life.
Karbala (2015)
Karbala (2015)
On 3 April 2004, during the holiday of Ashura, Iraqi rebels loyal to Shiite leader Muktada As-Sadr, launched an insurgency in the Polish zone. The Poles, together with Bulgarian soldiers and Iraqi police, were given the task of defending City Hall, led by Lieutenant colonel Grzegorz Kaliciak. The clash developed into the biggest Polish engagement since World War II. Not a single allied soldier died, although about 80 insurgents were killed in a counter-attack.
The Third Part of the Night (1972)
The Third Part of the Night (1972)
Set during the Nazi occupation of Poland, in which Michał witnesses the murder of his mother, wife and child. He is hurled into a life that literally is not his own; a surreal world littered with trapdoors, doppelgängers and wormholes. It also tells the true untold story of a vaccine laboratory where Jews and members of the resistance were employed as feeders for parasites infected with typhus.
Passenger (1963)
Passenger (1963)
A German woman on a ship returning to Europe notices a face of another woman which brings recollections from the past. She tells her husband that she had been an overseer in Auschwitz during the war, but she has actually saved a woman's life.
The Legions (2019)
The Legions (2019)
A universal story about entering adulthood in difficult times, growing up to the community. The great history is the background for the love story unfolding in the foreground: Józek, a deserter from the tsarist army who joins the emerging Legions, an intelligence agent for the I Brigade and Women’s Leage member – Ola, and Tadek, her fiancée, a member of Shooting Team.
Dark Crimes (2016)
Suicide Room (2011)
Suicide Room (2011)
Moody, dark and handsome Dominik is tormented by his classmates after video footage of his drunken kiss with bully Alex is spread across the Internet. Grappling with the public humiliation Dominik seeks solace in an avatar based “suicide room” where the pink-haired rebel Sylvia consoles him.
The Lure (2015)
Knife in the Water (1962)
Knife in the Water (1962)
On their way to an afternoon on the lake, husband and wife Andrzej and Krystyna nearly run over a young hitchhiker. Inviting the young man onto the boat with them, Andrzej begins to subtly torment him; the hitchhiker responds by making overtures toward Krystyna. When the hitchhiker is accidentally knocked overboard, the husband's panic results in unexpected consequences.
Demon (2015)
Demon (2015)
A bridegroom is possessed by an unquiet spirit in the midst of his own wedding celebration, in this clever take on the Jewish legend of the dybbuk.
Jack Strong (2014)
Jack Strong (2014)
Poland, 1970. Firmly determined to fight against Soviet tyranny and prevent the destruction of the world, the high-ranking officer of the Polish army Ryszard Kukliński makes a serious decision that will put his life, his family and the fate of an entire nation at risk.
Aftermath (2012)
Aftermath (2012)
Two brothers are trying to find out the truth from years ago. The whole town is against them.
Sweat (2021)
Sweat (2021)
Three days in the life of fitness motivator Sylwia Zając, whose presence on social media has made her a celebrity. Although she has hundreds of thousands of followers, is surrounded by loyal employees and admired by acquaintances, she is looking for true intimacy.
The Dark House (2009)
The Dark House (2009)
Poland, 1978. Edward Srodon, a zootechnician, makes an accidental stop at the Dziabas family farm, located in the remote area of the Bieszczady Mountains. Years later, on a winter day during Martial Law, a People's Militia investigation team examines a crime scene.
Prime Time (2021)
Prime Time (2021)
On the last day of 1999, 20-year-old Sebastian locks himself in a TV studio. He has two hostages, a gun, and an important message for the world. The story of the attack explores a rebel’s extreme measures and last resort.
Leave No Traces (2021)
Leave No Traces (2021)
In 1983, communist Poland is shaken by the case of high school student Grzegorz Przemyk, who is beaten to death by police. The only witness of the beating becomes the number one enemy of the state.
Night Train (1959)
Night Train (1959)
Two strangers, Jerzy and Marta, accidentally end up holding tickets for the same sleeping chamber on an overnight train to the Baltic Sea coast. Also on board is Marta's spurned lover, who will not leave her alone. When the police enter the train in search of a murderer on the lam, rumors fly and everything seems to point toward one of the main characters as the culprit.
Interrogation (1989)
Interrogation (1989)
In Stalinist Poland, cabaret singer Tonia decides to spend the evening drinking with a group of friends. The next morning, she awakes to find that, for reasons unknown to her, she has been jailed as a political prisoner. As prison officials interrogate, torture and humiliate her, she fights for survival and to maintain her innocence by refusing to sign a false confession. As her years of imprisonment pass, her relationship with her captors grows more complicated.
Lynch (2010)
Lynch (2010)
The story unfolds about the murder of an old man living in a remote village and six locals who may have been connected with the murder. Things get messy when the dead man turns out to be an ex convict. The accused ones find it very hard to deal with the preconceived attitude. The villagers, led by the families of the accused, have to fight for their innocence.
On the Silver Globe (1989)
On the Silver Globe (1989)
A small group of cosmic explorers, including a woman, leaves Earth to start a new civilization. They do not realize that within themselves they carry the end of their own dream. They die one by one, while their children revert to a primitive native culture, creating new myths and a new god.